Jezebel To HuffPost Blogger: 'Literary Critic Hates Vaginas'

Over the weekend, Huffington Post blogger Anis Shivani posted "The 15 Most Overrated Contemporary American Writers," which quickly became hot on Twitter and as of yesterday, the number-one most popular story on Huffington Post. Leaving no literary sacred cow untouched, Shivani skewered many favorites, sparking a heated discussion on the web.

Yesterday, the blog Jezebel posted this response: Literary Critic Hates Vaginas, saying,
"People are obviously reading too much these days. That must be why one critic felt the need to list the 15 writers (9 of them women) we should all stop reading right now." The article picks apart Shivani's criticism, accusing him of the bad writing he points out in his article. Though in the end they praise his desire to post a list of underrated writers, the author still thinks Shivani should have kept his opinion to himself.

Who's right? Jezebel or HuffPost? Or are you tired of the fray? Vote in the poll below:

Quick Poll

Jezebel or Shivani: Who's right?

Girls win

Loved Shivani's blog

Oh who cares?

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Comments

[ItsAD]

10:17 AM on 10/02/2010

I'm firmly in the "Who Cares?" camp. It was a crappy article that made crappy points about mediocre-or-just-over-mediocre writers. Yeah, Safran Foer isn't breaking too much new ground. But it also has nothing to do with women. Everyone simmer down.

[Nebris]

12:11 PM on 08/12/2010

Reading Shivani's nasty little hack job would be enough to make anyone testy.

[RobinSeattle]

01:47 AM on 08/12/2010

She is absolutely right. People should be able to hide behind their gender in order to avoid criticism.

Okay, maybe not.

[I AM AN EXIT]

12:45 AM on 08/12/2010

Newsflash, Jezebel hates penis. Who cares if the majority were women. Does equality mean that he could only put 50% women, or does it mean that he didn't choose them based on gender? I am sick of this faux feminism. You know, real feminists fought actual sexism and sacrificed much to give more opportunities to women. This is just maddening, this fake or petty outrage we see today. And that goes for any activist group "fighting" for minorities. Certainly there are battles worth waging still, I don't think this, or whining at the daily show counts.

[RobinSeattle]

01:57 AM on 08/12/2010

The problem in our entropic, demographically obsessed overadvertised monetize absolutely everything America is that feminism has become a hustle just as religion, the drug war, civil rights, and political punditry have (well, okay, two of those have always been scams). So you get knee jerk defensive nonsense such as what the author of the blog post in Jezebel wrote rather than admitting that not all people see books or authors the same way and the piece she objected to was merely one relatively unknown guy's opinion.

The irony in Jezebel's response if that it keeps discussion of the critique in question by a writer few have heard of in the marketplace of ideas much longer than if it had just let the article die the natural death all such screeds do. Sometimes, silence really is golden.

[ItsAD]

10:18 AM on 10/02/2010

That's a racist, sexist, and anti-Semitic thing to say. ;)

[maddocbrown]

09:46 PM on 08/10/2010

This just in: Jezebel reads with her vagina!

[RobinSeattle]

02:00 AM on 08/12/2010

The question is, is the image your hilarious assertion provoked in my sleazy little brain illegal in any states? I probably can't get into Australia now with that in my mind.

Now see what a can of worms you've opened? :p

Cheers.

[mithras95]

08:40 PM on 08/10/2010

Huh? Would this have raised any hackles if most of the writers had been men? I don't agree with Shivani (the little of read of Antonya Nelson, for instance, I have enjoyed), and he seems more than a little bitter...but to turn this into a v@g issue is just plain dumb.

[Chris Cole]

06:49 PM on 08/10/2010

jezebel's side, without a doubt.

[PelePele10]

03:55 PM on 08/10/2010

I don't think Jezebel read the article, I don't blame them, it was a bit long. But if you did you'd find that it wasn't attacking the writers for but rather disagreeing with their hype, saturation on best sellers lists and at times literally a particular book/literature presented by the writer than may have garnered more acclaim that it deserved. Nothing wrong with that as it happens a lot in the literary world. Also the list wasn't all female writers so what's the beef here? Nada. What feminist is seriously going to defend Amy Tan or Jhumpa Lahiri? Get outta here with that.

[RobinSeattle]

02:03 AM on 08/12/2010

PelePele10, you're getting in the way of a good snit. Party pooper! :p

[PelePele10]

04:44 AM on 08/12/2010

Lol, sorry about that! I'm new here ;-)

[JamesSin]

03:09 PM on 08/10/2010

The comments here fall into two categories:
Decrying the bitter,angry feminists at Jezebel.
Or people attacking the first type of comment by accusing the commenter of defaming feminism.
Because facts are stubborn, both sides have some merits.

Jezebel is the Louis Farrakhan of feminism. Just because Louis Farrakhan is a loon doesn't mean that racism doesn't exist. Similarly, just because so many of the commenters/writers at Jezebel are complete loons doesn't mean sexism isn't real.

[HPdevotee]

07:42 AM on 08/11/2010

>>"...so many of the commenters/writers at Jezebel are complete loons doesn't mean sexism isn't real."

As evidenced by your post. Good Job.

[JamesSin]

10:48 AM on 08/11/2010

I don't know whether you're expressing profound ignorance or impotent rage.

[cityprole]

03:07 PM on 08/10/2010

I actually found the article amusing, especially since none of them were writers whom I read..almost a couple of them, but i tend to shy away from anything that's hyped too enthusiastically by critics whose taste i find suspect..
I didn't find the article particularly anti-vagina (define your terms, Jezzebel!) but then again, it was pretty much anti-everyone and anyone, naughty bits or no...thoroughly enjoyable...

[rabbit47]

02:31 PM on 08/10/2010

I am a woman and a feminist, and I disagree with you. There are some amazing, brave, inventive, and brilliant female writers. Louise Erdrich and the late, great Iris Murdoch are just two examples.
Mr. Shivani did not say that the authors he listed were bad or untalented. He said that they were not brave enough to write the books they could have written. Publishers and the male establishment insult women when they glorify work that is not the best they could do. It is like patting a child on the head and saying, "You tried, dear. I know you did the best you could." Then, there's the "but". Most men will still not read a book by a woman. Glorifying adequate, workmanlike novels as great literature does not help.

[Mathilde1469]

03:13 PM on 08/11/2010

I earnestly posit this question: What does "not brave enough to write the books they could have written" mean?

It is honest to say that sometimes a work of fiction fails. It is NOT honest to attribute that failure to bravery. In the trenches, one can assume that whatever is written is the best that one could do at that moment. Both Jezebel's notion that the list is 'vagina-hating' and Shivani's estimation of 'bravery' being what the work lacks is as infantalizing as it is infantile.

The market drives much of what we see as literature these days. As long as what passes as criticism is a glorified press release, this is what readers get. In that sense, we get what we deserve.

[Tergenev]

01:07 PM on 08/10/2010

I think it was fabulous. It was a blow torch taken to the entire American literary intelligentsia establishment about all those serious writers that nobody can actually stand to read. And I say this as a long time fan of Jhumpa Lahiri and a person with an English lit degree. I sure didn't agree with all of Shivani's points, but I think it was high time somebody threw a few stink bombs into that particular room.

[longtimegone]

12:55 PM on 08/10/2010

I'm glad someone was allowed to point out how mean spirited, self indulgent, and, ultimately, unnecessary Shivani's screed was; the comment line was very heavily censored for comments that tried to express just that.

[ICarr]

12:51 PM on 08/10/2010

The women included in Shivani's blog were included not because they are women, but because Shivani believes that they are overrated writers.

If Shivani really hated vaginas, then he would have included *no* women.

And - am I the only one who finds the reductive nature of the Jezebel headline problematic? "Literary Critic Hates Vaginas" - really??

[calluna]

07:23 AM on 08/11/2010

The full headline is: "Literary Critic Hates Vaginas, "Ghetto Volume," that last being a jab at, I think, Junot Diaz, who, last time I checked, does not possess a vagina.

[Jeanette Ponder]

11:53 AM on 08/10/2010

OK...really though, Jezebel exists for ladies who love to be victims in the name of "feminism." I'm a feminist, and I have no part in the continual ragegasms and Outrage Olympics that happen on that site on a daily basis. Much like the Daily Show hoopla they perpetrated, this exists for no other reason than to draw readers to their site.

By the by, Jezebel is doing pretty poorly. Many readers have fled due to the ridiculous commenters, and the editors/writers seem to pick the silliest things to talk about. Sad. Stick with other feminist sites that are smarter and less ridiculous.

[Lise Brown]

12:31 PM on 08/10/2010

But really, though, Jezebel is not what you describe it as. I'm a Jezebel-loving feminist and I don't play the victim, and it's incredibly unfair for you to say that I do. Yes, Jezebel writers/commenters have made mistakes - who hasn't? And the Daily Show hoopla, as you call it, might not have been very well done (Irin's original article wasn't very well researched, I'll give you that) but at least it got people talking about sexism and women in media.
What makes *me* sad is when fellow feminists look down upon sites like Jezebel and call it "silly" and "ridiculous." If you don't like the site, fine. But don't write it off so quickly. Because many of us don't go there for the "ragegasms," but rather for the conversation and the community. Try not to judge us too harshly...us "ridiculous commenters" will, in turn, try not to judge you for making rude assumptions and inaccurate observations.

[Jeanette Ponder]

05:21 PM on 08/10/2010

Yeah...I've been reading it for several years, so mine isn't a drive-by opinion. I stand by my comments. The site is irritating and quickly becoming a joke among feminists for its slipshod reporting and angsty commenteriat.